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The spotted turtle (<i>Clemmys guttata</i>) and Blanding’s turtle (<i>Emydoidea blandingii</i>) are two state-endangered species in Indiana whose populations are in decline. Historically, both species were found across the northern portion of Indiana in various wetland habitats. There are multiple causes of population decline for both species, including habitat fragmentation, habitat loss and degradation, urban development and encroachment, poaching, and road mortality. Despite efforts to record these species across the state, there has been no intensive population assessments. Based on this need, I conducted both visual encounter surveys across the state and used Maximum Entropy (MaxEnt) modeling to facilitate understanding the current distribution of both species in Indiana. Twenty-three locations were visited and surveyed in Indiana, with trapping being conducted at an additional four locations where populations were known to be larger. Surveys aided in delineation of six populations of Blanding’s turtles and five populations of spotted turtles. A total of 69 Blanding’s turtles and 70 spotted turtles were observed between surveying and trapping. Delineated populations were mainly found in the northern third of Indiana. This data and other occurrences were used to predict suitable habitat across Indiana. The Blanding’s turtle models were sufficiently resolved to predict potential localities or potential sites for focused management or repatriation. Spotted turtle model performance reflected the need for more samples, but also the likelihood of fewer numbers due to declining habitat availability. Both Blanding’s turtle and spotted turtle models argue for the need of more intense survey efforts based on historical occurrences, as well as restoration efforts across the state. Most models for both species were observed to have a trend towards suitable habitat in the northern third of the state, correlating with the results of the survey efforts. The results of this project indicate that Blanding’s turtle and spotted turtle populations are still in decline likely due to limited habitat availability.

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<div>Human disturbance to birds is a subject of concern for bird conservation. Bird recreationalists, such as birders and bird photographers, who actively seek out birds, are identified as a broad group of people that contribute to bird disturbance. There are few studies on birders’ and bird photographers’ perceptions and behaviors related to bird disturbance, and these studies have conflicting results. Furthermore, little research identifies why bird recreationalists engage in behavior that disturbs birds. Understanding perceptions and behavior related to bird disturbance and the context behind engaging in this behavior is important for creating comprehensive solutions for preventing disturbance to birds. The purpose of this thesis is to create a typology of bird recreationalists, based on whether they engage in birding or bird photography as primary activities; identify the socio-demographic characteristics among bird recreationalists that are connected to an increased likelihood to engage in behavior that disturbs birds; assess perceptions of blame for disturbance to birds; and identify how motivations, barriers, challenges and trade-offs are associated with following ethical birding and bird photography guidelines. </div><div><br></div><div>The thesis used an online survey and in-person interviews of birders and bird photographers in two Midwestern states in the U.S., Illinois and Indiana, to achieve these objectives. Three sub-groups of bird recreationalists were identified through the online survey: individuals who only engage in birding; individuals who primarily engage in birding and secondarily, bird photography; and individuals who primarily engage in bird photography and secondarily, birding. Our findings indicate that individuals who 1) are male, 2) only engage in birding, 3) maintain life lists, 4) have more birds on their life lists, 5) can identify more birds by sight, 6) have more years of experience or 7) have a higher level of achievement-oriented motivation are more likely to engage in potentially harmful behaviors to birds. Additionally, quantitative findings suggest that birders and bird photographers may not perceive themselves as main contributors to bird disturbance. </div><div><br></div><div>The qualitative portion of the research identifies multiple ethical birding and bird photography guidelines that recreationalists found challenging to follow that had both ecological (e.g., maintaining distance) and social (e.g., respectfully educating others) implications. Recreationalists identified listing, photographing and seeing birds as key motivations to breaking ethical guidelines. Barriers to following guidelines included apathy, ignorance and improper technology. Finally, recreationalists identified bad photography and missed experiences as major trade-offs associated with following ethical guidelines. he concepts explored in this thesis research provide important management implications for natural resource managers and stakeholders in bird conservation and suggest a further need for examining bird recreationalists’ decision-making around bird disturbance.</div>

<p>Red spruce forests, one of the most critically endangered ecosystems in the United States</p>provides critical habitat for several endemic species or subspecies of the Appalachian Mountains, including the Virginia northern flying squirrel. Once listed as threatened under the Endangered Species Act, the Virginia northern flying squirrel was delisted in 2013. Managers are currently focusing their efforts on projects that increase the extent and connectivity of the squirrel’s habitat through red spruce restoration. At present, there is a paucity of available data to assess the implications of the silvicultural activities associated with red spruce restoration on the movement and occupancy of the Virginia northern flying squirrel. In order to inform management activities, I measured home range, fine-scale habitat use, and estimated detection and occupancy for northern flying squirrels across a gradient of red spruce stands in the Monongahela National Forest. I concluded that home ranges for northern flying squirrels within this region are comprised primarily of red spruce and that northern flying squirrels were selecting larger diameter trees compared to the nearest available neighbor. Additionally, I found that microhabitat characteristics alone did not sufficiently predict northern flying squirrel occupancy and that acoustic methods for surveying northern flying squirrels will require further refinement. Future research efforts should focus on a combination of landscape-level and microhabitat covariates to best predict occupancy of this species across the landscape. Future red spruce management should be approached with caution regarding the potential impact on northern flying squirrel habitat in the short-term. I recommended using spatially-explicit modeling to assess the long-term effects of proposed red spruce restoration projects on northern flying squirrel population demographics, dispersal, and metapopulation connectivity prior to the implementation of silvicultural treatments.

<p><b></b>Passive acoustic monitoring (PAM) is a tool with immense potential to evaluate the response of wildlife to ecosystem disturbances. PAM allows to evaluate wildlife dynamics by means of acoustic indices that estimate the diversity or complexity of sounds in a recording, as well as to study ecological aspects at the species level by training machine learning-based automatic acoustic detector. In this study, five deep learning approaches for automatic song detection were evaluated of the near-threatened Bachman's Sparrow in data scarcity scenarios, and then used this classifier to study the response of this bird to the number of days following a prescribed burn in six subtropical habitats in central Florida. At the same time, the response of avifauna acoustic activity to prescribed burning was quantified by means of three of the most used acoustic indices used in the literature (Acoustic Complexity Index, Acoustic Diversity Index and Bioacoustic Index). I found that it is possible to construct competitive birdsong detectors with small datasets using pre-trained models regardless. Furthermore, the use of data augmentation can lead to a detriment of the detector performance, especially of lower quality recordings, and that increasing the dataset does not necessarily increase the generalizability of the model. On the other hand, I found that unlike Acoustic Diversity Index, the Bioacoustic and Acoustic Complexity indices are negatively correlated with time after a burn, the same trend that Bachman's Sparrow presence showed, even though it was more influenced by habitat type than by the effect of the prescribed burns. This study shows the potential of tools including automatic song detection and acoustic indices to model at different scales the dynamics of avifauna in response to ecosystem disturbances. Their development can provide efficient tools for the study and conservation of both threatened wildlife species and the ecosystems they inhabit.</p>

<p>This research combines the economic contribution analysis of hardwood industries in Indiana and the economic impact analysis of furbearer hunting and trapping in Indiana. This research employs input-output analysis using Impact Analysis for Planning (IMPLAN) software. </p>